Personal Independence Payment: Disabled People

[Dr Rosena Allin-Khan in the Chair]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered Personal Independence Payment and disabled people.

I am proud to have secured this debate today, and to be able to stand up for the disabled in the light of the catastrophic effects that the proposed cut to personal independence payments will have on them. This is the week after the council elections and the Runcorn and Helsby by-election proved disastrous for at least two major parties. The issue on everyone’s lips, and the cause of much of the disaffection, was welfare cuts, and specifically cuts to personal independence payments.

I begin by thanking in advance all those who will take part in this debate, all those watching, all those in the outside world who are campaigning against the cuts and, above all, the disabled community itself, which, day by day, shows exemplary resilience and courage.

The Chancellor of the Exchequer, in her spring statement, raised the curtain on a series of welfare cuts: the health element of universal credit will be cut by 50% and frozen for new claimants, and the Office for Budget Responsibility has outlined that the planned cuts to disability benefits will reduce PIP for at least 800,000 claimants and cut health-related universal credit payments for 3 million families. And that is just the beginning.

On that point, I thank my right hon. Friend because many of my Slough constituents are extremely concerned about the proposed welfare cuts, especially to personal independence payments and other disability benefits. Unlike the Conservative-Lib Dem coalition that embarked on austerity, and unlike Conservative Governments of recent years that became characterised as “the nasty party,” does my right hon. Friend agree that it is the job, indeed the moral duty, of this Government to protect the most vulnerable so that they can lead a dignified and independent life?

I entirely agree with my hon. Friend. The Government insist that the rising disability benefits bill means that something must be done, but in a recent report, the New Economics Foundation revealed that the disability benefits bill has risen because there has been a rise in the number of disabled people and a rise in deprivation. But, as we learned from David Cameron’s round of austerity, cuts have consequences that severely limit, or even eliminate, their supposed savings.

In my Birmingham Perry Barr constituency, notwithstanding these forecasted cuts, people are already suffering because the Department for Work and Pensions—or perhaps His Majesty’s Revenue and Customs—is trying to clamp down and suspend benefits such as PIP. That is causing immense anxiety for disabled and vulnerable adults, who are now having to seek an appeal while their benefits are being cut. Does the right hon. Member agree that an equality impact assessment needs to be conducted now, as opposed to simply cutting £5 billion in the near future?

I entirely agree with the hon. Gentleman. We need an equality impact assessment now, and I cannot understand why the Government are introducing these random welfare benefit cuts without allowing MPs to understand fully what the consequences will be. The fact that the proposed welfare cuts come on top of the cut to the winter fuel allowance and the failure to raise the child benefit ceiling makes everything worse.

The furious response to their proposed welfare cuts, particularly the cuts to personal independence payments, seems to have come as a surprise to the Government. PIP is a benefit intended to help people who have a health condition or disability with the extra costs of living. Unfortunately, some people, including some Ministers, talk about it as if it were a handout.

Does the right hon. Member agree that PIP is not an income, and that those councils that count it as income should be called out? Leicester city council counts PIP as income. The number of people applying for PIP is therefore reducing, and they are not getting council tax support. People like my constituent Jason will be £900 worse off.

PIP is certainly not an income, and I imagine that the Minister will be in contact with Leicester city council to try to understand what it thinks it is doing.

The new points system that the Government are suggesting for people to qualify for the maximum level of PIP is particularly concerning. For instance, it will mean that people who cannot wash below their waist could lose points and lose benefits, and be expected to find a job. Focus groups are revolted when they hear that. The country’s anger at these cuts boiled over last week in spectacular fashion with the by-election in Runcorn, where Labour lost its 16th safest seat.

I commend the right hon. Lady for securing this debate. Westminster Hall is full today, so this is clearly a massive issue.

PIP is effectively a lifeline to help to maintain people’s wellness and independence, and in many cases people’s employment, so more needs to be done. Furthermore, if a claimant no longer qualifies for the daily living component, any carer will also lose their direct access to carer’s allowance, which would be a loss of £10,000 on top of the other money that is lost. This situation is a minefield for those who are disabled and depend on PIP to continue having some quality of life. Does the right hon. Lady agree that today the Minister must give us many, many answers and change the policy?

It is indeed a cruel and brutal system that needs reform. It does not need cuts.

Elements of the Labour party seem to want to claim that the loss of the by-election in Runcorn and the fact that Labour lost two thirds of the council seats we were defending was all about immigrants. However, voter surveys show that, far from being all about immigrants, the single most important reason for vote-switching was anger at the Government for the winter fuel allowance and welfare cuts, such as the proposed cut to PIP. Immigration came well down the list.

Labour people who went out knocking on doors said that two issues came up over and again: cuts to winter fuel payments; and cuts to personal independence payments. However, despite the catastrophic results last week, the Prime Minister has made it clear that nothing will deter him from pushing ahead with these cuts. So far, his only concession has been to say that he will go “further and faster.”

In my Hackney North and Stoke Newington constituency, well over 8,000 people are on either personal independence payment or disability living allowance, which translates nationwide to hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of men and women whose fury will only mount as they find that, month by month, their payments are shrinking or disappearing altogether.

The Labour leadership have not helped their case for cutting PIP by putting forward a set of contradictory arguments. On the one hand, they insist that they are helping the disabled by putting them back to work, but on the other hand, they say this cut will save £9 billion. Well, they cannot do both. Putting disabled people into rewarding, sustained employment, which we would all support, means spending money on training, therapy and childcare. In the short run, putting disabled people into jobs will not save money; it will actually cost more. The only certain way that cutting PIP saves the billions of pounds that the Government want is by making PIP recipients live on less, and this is something that Ministers claim they do not want to do.

I thank the right hon. Member for her powerful speech. I briefly draw attention to some figures from the Public and Commercial Services Union about its members working in the Department for Work and Pensions, including in jobcentres. Almost 50% of PCS members working in the DWP claim the very benefits that they process. Many of them rely on PIP to work, which further underlines the point she is making about the folly of cutting the benefits that enable people working for the Government to deliver these policies—they will not be able to do so if those benefits are cut. Does she agree that these cuts will punish sick and disabled people, including those working for the Government in this policy area?

Far from enabling the Government to put people into work, removing PIP will actually stop people working, because they depend on PIP for the extra cost of going to work.

Perhaps the most preposterous argument for cutting disability payments is that it is the moral choice. This is obviously nonsense. In what universe is slashing benefits for the disabled moral? No one is taken in by that, not even those who think that all benefit claimants are scroungers.

I have a constituent who has two sons suffering with cystic fibrosis. The condition means they have to be on a high-calorie, high-fat diet, so the cost of their food is much more than the ordinary shop. On top of that, my constituent has to bear the additional costs of buying medication and the loss of income as a result of having to be a carer for her two children. My right hon. Friend mentioned the need to look after our children. Does she agree that we need a system in which PIP provides for individuals such as my constituent’s two sons, so that children can also have the support to lead good-quality lives?

I entirely agree. Furthermore, it seems to me that Ministers have not really looked into the costs that PIP is covering, otherwise they would not be talking about slashing it in this way.

I wonder whether it ever occurs to the Government that voters will begin to notice that whenever they want money, they take it from the most vulnerable—old people, poor children and now the disabled. When we suggest a wealth tax, they recoil in horror, yet a 2% levy on men and women whose assets are worth more than £10 million would affect only 0.4% of the UK population and raise £24 billion a year. Politics is the language of choices, and sadly, this Government are making a conscious choice to balance their books on the back of people on welfare in general and the disabled in particular.

Does my right hon. Friend share my concerns that, by the Government’s own estimates, 300,000 people will be pushed into relative poverty by 2030 and, as a result, will need to rely on council services that are already severely oversubscribed? Does she agree that these cuts, without funding for council emergency services, will be a disastrous combination that risks exacerbating the pressures already faced by our local councils?

There is no question but that my hon. Friend is correct. These cuts will put even more pressure on local authorities, which are already in difficulties.

There is all this talk about getting disabled people into jobs—what jobs? The areas of employment where there are labour shortages tend to be minimum wage, like social care, or seasonal, like agricultural work. The DWP’s own figures show around 102,000 registered vacancies. Of those, only 807 can be done completely remotely, of which 127 are with employers that the DWP describes as Disability Confident, and of those just 10 are part time. Where are these jobs that the Government want to coerce the disabled into, and with what employers?

The PIP claimants that the Government want to force back to work may have physical disabilities, but they may also be severely depressed or have mental health problems. Most employers will not tolerate the intermittent patterns of employment and long periods out of the labour market that come with those types of health problems. Furthermore, there is very little evidence that cutting benefits boosts employment—a point made by a group of concerned charities recently—and, as the hon. Member for Bristol Central (Carla Denyer) said earlier, Ministers seem to miss the point that PIP is paid to disabled people regardless of whether they are in work. That means that many of the women and men the Government are taking PIP off already have jobs.

Supporters of the Government’s cuts claim that, all too often, men and women on welfare are “taking the mickey”—I am quoting a Minister there—or making a “lifestyle choice”. People who describe welfare as a lifestyle choice obviously do not actually know many people who live on welfare. The poor housing, the struggle to pay for the basics and the humiliation they often endure mean that it is not a lifestyle that anybody would choose.

I thank the right hon. Member for her passionate speech and, in particular, for highlighting the real human impact of these cuts. Over 1 million disabled people were forced to use food banks last year, while, for many others, basics such as affording transport to hospital appointments will be jeopardised by these cuts. Does that not only emphasise and underline the case that right hon. Member was making: that this is a political choice, and that asking the very wealthiest in society to pay a bit more in tax would be the moral thing to do?

It is indeed a political choice. I would prefer my Government to introduce a wealth tax or some taxation system that asks the very wealthy to pay a little more than take money away from the poorest and most vulnerable people in our society. But the Government refuse to accept that there is anything wrong with cutting benefits for the disabled. Instead, they say that there has been a “communication problem”. Some of us have tried explaining to Downing Street that they could employ the best communicators in the world, but these welfare cuts will be impossible to sell to the public and will undermine Labour’s position in communities.